Arena Profile: Raul Grijalva

In his fourth term as a Member of Congress, Representative Raúl M. Grijalva remains committed to his constituents in Congressional District 7.

Over the past 40 years, Raúl has built an exceptional record of public service within his district, earning him a solid base of enthusiastic supporters. Raúl began his public career as a community organizer when he joined with several other advocates to start El Rio Community Health Center. During his time at El Rio, Raúl worked with other activists to encourage local governments to invest in older and minority neighborhoods. He helped organize neighborhood empowerment efforts that prompted the city of Tucson to expand services to the south and west sides, including the construction of neighborhood service centers such as El Rio, El Pueblo and Fred Archer, in order to serve older minority areas of Tucson.

From 1974 to 1986, Raúl served on the Tucson Unified School District Governing Board, serving as chairman during his last three years on the board. Raúl was the first Latino elected to TUSD in more than 100 years. During his tenure at TUSD, he worked with the courts, Superintendent, and educators on a desegregation plan and was the lead Board member in implementing the integration plan. He was a hands-on board member who worked to increase funding and support for public education, and who advocated on behalf of teacher, employee and civil rights. Upon his retirement, an elementary school was named after Raúl in order to honor his service and contributions to education in TUSD.

Raúl continued his service to the community when he was elected to the Pima County Board of Supervisors, where he served from 1989 to 2002. While on the Board of Supervisors, he managed a $1 billion budget and ensured that the county was at the forefront of issues such as domestic partner benefits, labor rights, and transparent government. Additionally, he was a staunch advocate for balanced planning and fairness in land-use decisions. His leadership led to the creation of the Sonoran Desert Conservation Plan, an innovative approach to species and habitat protection in concert with land-use planning in the community. As a Supervisor, Raúl also continued his advocacy for working families through passage of a bond package that contained a $10 million commitment to reinvest in older, poorer neighborhoods and to fund a county housing trust.

Since his election to Congress in 2002, education, employee rights and the environment have been among Raúl’s top policy concerns.

As a member of the Committee on Education and Labor, Congressman Grijalva will be making the reform and full funding of No Child Left Behind his top educational priority for the 111th Congress. His previous work on the Committee helped to fund early childhood and preschool programs within our nation’s consistently underfunded education system. He has successfully worked to improve funding to Migrant and Seasonal Head Start and to enhance outreach and services to Limited English Proficient children and their families. He also has worked to improve the quality of life for working families by promoting minimum wage increases, supporting legislation to prevent intimidation, and pushing to help employees organize and represent themselves in the workplace. Raúl is also a member of the Committee on Natural Resources, where he has been appointed Chairman of the National Parks, Forests and Public Lands Subcommittee. The Subcommittee oversees 600 million acres of federal land. As Chairman of the Subcommittee, Raúl has undertaken a broad set of issues and plays a major role in seeking to provide funding to address the maintenance funding shortfall of our public lands. In his role as Chairman, Raúl has championed efforts to advance the National Landscape Preservation System, protect wilderness areas, protect endangered species, advance the National Parks Service Centennial Initiative, protect the Grand Canyon from the threat of expanded uranium mining, advance ecological restoration on Federal lands, and address the need for a budget fix for wildland fire suppression funding. In the 111th Congress, Raúl will be working with the full committee to address reform of the General Mining Law of 1872, passage of needed wilderness protection throughout the west and oversight of the operations of our national parks, forests and public lands systems.
Raúl has shown his commitment to a clean environment through his leadership in several key Congressional caucuses, including his ongoing service as Co-Chair of the Congressional National Landscape Conservation System Caucus and his leading role in the Environment Task Force Caucus, which he chaired from 2003 to 2006.

Other important leadership roles include Raúl’s election, by his peers, to serve as 1st Vice Chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus in the 110th Congress. In that role, as well as in his overall career, Raúl has been a leader in uniting diverse factions of the Latino community in order to focus on common goals. Raúl has also worked stridently for comprehensive immigration reform, standing up to those who want to exploit fear, insecurities and hatred in order to distract from our society’s need to resolve our national and international policy objectives. Other legislative priorities for Raúl in the 111th Congress include the redeployment of our troops out of Iraq so that they may return home to their families and loved ones. Raúl also will continue to fight for affordable health care for all. He will again support an aggressive approach to increasing the use of alternative fuels, increased CAFE standards for trucks and SUVs, and increasing our capacity to generate electricity and energy from fossil fuel-based technologies.

Raúl was born and raised in Tucson, Arizona. His father emigrated from Mexico in 1945 as a bracero, a laborer brought in by the U.S. government to help offset the loss of skilled American ranch hands serving in World War II. Raúl's parents stressed the importance of education to their three children. It was that encouragement that led Raúl to his career in public service. Raúl and his wife, Ramona, have been married for almost 40 years. They have three daughters, Adelita, Raquel and Marisa, as well as two grandchildren, Adelina and Raúlito. For the Grijalva family, the betterment of their community is a career and lifelong commitment.

Raul Grijalva's Recent Discussions

Arizona: Pariah state or mainstream?

To POLITICO's Seung Min Kim

The results of this latest poll only reaffirm the divide we have already been witnessing and discussing in this country. The statistical division is not surprising because we’ve been fed political arguments demonizing immigrants for years. It’s interesting that even some people who support the law think it will eventually lead to discrimination. A wide majority of Hispanics and people of color think the law is wrong and will lead to profiling. We need comprehensive immigration reform in this country not only for the benefits it will bring, but to close the policy breach extremists have been able to fill in the absence of national action.

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